Crew Status: The crew is working well as a very unified team. We all feel very good about the things that are being accomplished.

Daily Recap: Today was our seventh day of full simulation. In the morning, crewmembers worked on reports, developed the EVA schedule for the day (Foltyn and Diaz), performed GreenHab maintenance and repairs (Russell and Collins), and continued the repair of the Remote Radio (McCarthy, Foltyn, and Wardlow). The crew also received a visit from Don Foutz. Don brought diesel fuel and took the Linux computer to get fixed.

In the afternoon, EVA-14 (McCarthy, Foltyn, and Collins, along with Russell as Habcom) was directed at the continued maintenance of the remote radio by the Hab. EVA-15 (Diaz and Wardlow, along with Russell as Habcom) was a full ATV EVA and it was intended at exploring the terrain east of Cactus Canyon, and obtaining water samples at Muddy Creek. However, the weather did not cooperate and EVA-15 had to be aborted about 1/3 of the way to the target destination.

Additional Comments:

EVA-15 Comments: The intent of this EVA was to reach Muddy Creek (east of Cactus Canyon) and to obtain water samples. This ATV EVA did not have the best start. One of the ATVs was having problems starting, and we had to get support from our EVA Habcom (Russell), who worked his magic and got us going. Aside from a minor detour, the EVA was going well, until we noticed that it was getting a bit cloudy. Soon after, we heard several thunders and the wind picked up significantly. That's when we knew we had to abort this exploration mission. We were about 1/3 to our target destination, but we had to come back to the Hab. Safety first! We marked this waypoint and we decided to return. As resilient explorers, we will come back to this waypoint and continue forth to our original target destination, hopefully, this coming Thursday (4-8-04) or Friday (4-9-04).

For details of these EVAs, refer to the EVA Report.

Tomorrow's Plan: Tomorrow's schedule calls for an ATV EVA up Lowell Highway to Muddy Creek. Other non-ATV EVAs will also take place.

Daily Reports: The following reports should be in by 21:30.

1. Commander's Check In (this report) -- Alejandro R. Diaz
2. XO/Journalist Report -- William McCarthy
3. GreenHab Report -- James Russell/Peter Collins
4. Engineering Report -- James Russell/Peter Collins
5. EVA Report -- Bill Foltyn